Drury realises American Dream with Xero US deal

Xero has took another step forward in realising its vision of delivering a fully integrated platform for small businesses.

The Kiwi cloud accounting firm says customers now have access to complete payroll functionality for electronic filing and payment for state payroll taxes in the three top US employer states of California, Florida, and Texas.

Integrated payroll for UK and NZ small businesses will be available in the next three months with the remaining US states to follow in 2015.

“Xero’s global platform and approach allow us to develop and learn from other countries and we’re excited to launch these innovations in the vast US market," says Rod Drury, CEO, Xero.

"We’re building on our success in Australia where we process over $AU1.5 billion of payroll transactions monthly to over 375,000 employees.

"Plus we're building on the recent acquisition of Monchilla in the US and the scaling of our development teams globally.

"This is the start of a wave of product innovations launching early this year. These innovations will deliver on our vision of a fully integrated platform for small businesses to work and collaborate on."

According to Drury, Xero’s cloud accounting platform is evolving into a broad business management solution, exceeding the functionality provided by legacy desktop software vendors.

"Payroll is usually the biggest expense for small business owners with time-consuming process," he adds.

"So integrated accounting and payroll is compelling and inevitable. Over 40% of our customers already use our payroll software in markets where it is available."

Continuing the company's momentum across the Pacific, over the past year, Xero has continued to scale its US-based customer support team in San Francisco and Denver.

“While other vendors cull their support teams, we are ensuring entrepreneurs have access to the resources they need to grow 24x7,” Drury adds.